Ask the Experts: What Age Should You Start a Young Horse

[Music] the question was of what age do you recommend starting a young horse specifically with the larger breeds yeah

go for it again in general and everything's in general in general I would I would think the spring of the 300 year is a nice time to start the

horses spring of the three year old year its more common in Europe to start them at two and a half but there's a lot of pressure on them in Europe to start them

at two and a half and I would say that a smaller horse that's fit and balanced a lot if you want to start lunging at two and a half towards the end of the year you could you could do that I'm more of

a fan of three I just think they get a little bit more setup on their bodies and ready for things when I had to do large groups of horses to start and we had a mixture of Stein's mares geldings

the whole nine yards we often did the mares first because I like to know what they were like to ride before I read them and then we would breed them one year and then see how they produced and then we would decide if they were a

riding horse or a breeding mare but I think the riding helped me decide who I wanted to breed them to so we always did the Maris first when they were three before the breeding season started and

we tried to breed them around May April May something like that so we had a couple of months under saddle the stands we would start earlier like the late two and a half just because they had pressure on them to get

them ready for for inspections and things so they'd started lunging at two and a half with muscles and all those things and then start riding them a little bit at two and a half late in the year and then back off in the winter not

even ride them would work on the marriage then and then we start the Stynes back again so that a few months to just take it easy but again if you have you know specifically to a larger breed I mean big horses I think we have

to be careful that joints are set up and things like that but also don't let them get too mature because they're getting smarter and more powerful so you know I

think starting horses correctly you don't have to really work them that hard you have to work them smart and I'm there started you can take a break again I mean 60 days or 90 days or something

to know something and then put them back out in the field again that's time well spent I think and I think the thing we have to be careful about is that we think it's a continuation all the time as soon as I start them okay we're gonna

keep going and I've got all these goals and you know I get excited and I'm gonna go take on this and take on that well I think sometimes stepping back is is a good thing I mentioned that today with the first horse with Lynch yeah

with the four-year-old I was so proud of her what a smart decision just to give that horse a break after the national championship for a couple months and he is a younger looking horse he's not that mature yet I thought that was just fantastic

[Music] you